The Ex-Mormon Factor

Migration slacks off - Demographers say fewer people are following jobs here.

LA Weekly/November 12, 2008

By Patrick Range McDonald

A little before 10 p.m. on Wednesday, the night after Proposition 8
was approved by the voters of California, Levi Jackman Foster arrives
at the Los Angeles Mormon Temple with scores of protestors after
marching four miles from a rally in West Hollywood, which drew several
thousand. Foster, a handsome blond, is 22, gay and angry. He's also an
ex-Mormon, the great-great-grandson of Nathaniel Tanner, one of the
founders of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, and a
relation to Levi Jackman, who surveyed the land where the church
created its national headquarters in Salt Lake City, Utah.

"I completely abandoned the church because it abandoned me," Foster
explains on the sidewalk outside the temple on Santa Monica Boulevard.
Now, he says, "Proposition 8 is tearing my family apart."

Foster's parents donated money and voted in favor of the ballot
measure that eliminates the right of gays and lesbians to legally
marry in California. "They weren't going to vote on it," Foster says,
"but the church told them to, so they did. They also gave money to
'Yes on 8' because the church told them to do that." Members of the
Mormon church contributed tens of millions of dollars to the "Yes on
8" campaign.

"The Mormons have been oppressed minorities in the past," Foster says,
as he looks through the temple gates, "and now they're doing the same
thing to us. It's something the church doesn't get."

Foster, in a gray sweater, dark jeans and leather boots, is here with
former boyfriend Sean Hemeon, 27, another ex-Mormon. Both men are
dressed more for a night of club hopping than demonstrating on the
streets of Los Angeles, but they are serious about the long walk
they've just completed with a hundred or so strangers, who carry "No
on 8" signs and chant "Equal rights!"

"A lot of gay men sat back and expected other people to do the work,"
says Hemeon, thinking about how things went wrong on Election Day. "I
was one of them."

Hemeon didn't get involved in the "No on 8" campaign until he visited
his brother in another part of California. When Hemeon drove up to the
house, he saw a "Yes on 8" sign in the front yard.

"I didn't say anything at the time," Hemeon admits, "but he knew I
wasn't happy. He could see it on my face."

That happened three weeks ago. As soon as Hemeon returned home to West
Hollywood, he volunteered for the "No on 8," working the phone banks
and passing out campaign literature on Election Day. Hemeon also sent
his brother an e-mail, telling him what he thought about the sign but
that he still loved him.

"I didn't get a response," he says, "until 20 minutes after the L.A.
Times called the vote for the 'Yes' side."

At this point, Foster gets antsy and leads a group away from the
wrought-iron gates on Santa Monica Boulevard, onto a side street and
up to the temple's front entrance. Two guards in white shirts and
black jackets stand on the other side of the gates.

"Is there someone we can have a dialogue with?" Foster asks the guards.

The guard tells him the church is closed for the evening and no one is
around. Foster stares at the guards. It occurs to him that if the
protestors can return the next day, they will effectively stop Mormon
church members from getting married.

"A temple is the only place [Mormons] can get married if they want to
get sealed to God," Foster says. "Whenever protesters show up, they
close the gates [at the temple] so no one can get in. It becomes a
convent where no one can get married."

Foster leads the crowd back to the gates on Santa Monica and just
before everyone starts the long walk back to West Hollywood, he
gathers everyone around.

"There are Mormons here tonight who have been kicked out their homes,"
he tells the protesters, "so we need to show up tomorrow and let them
what we think!"

The crowd roars. When Thursday comes, thousands of "No on 8"
protesters shut down the Los Angeles Mormon Temple. For the entire day
and into the night, the iconic building is surrounded by LAPD
officers, who seal off the temple's perimeter so no one can enter or
exit. Without fully realizing it, gay-marriage proponents have
stumbled upon an effective protest tool - close down a temple, and
Mormons, too, will not be able to marry each other. It's one of those
odd twists the leaders of the Mormon church probably never saw coming.

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